Grass of Parnassus

Andrew Lang

Grass of Parnassus

TOE. M. SPrimâ dicta mihi, summâ dicenda CamenâThe years will pass, and hearts will range,You conquer Time, and Care, and Change.Though Time doth still delight to shedThe dust on many a younger head;Though Care, oft coming, hath the guileFrom younger lips to steal the smile;Though Change makes younger hearts wax cold,And sells new loves for loves of old,Time, Change, nor Care, hath learned the artTo fleck your hair, to chill your heart,To touch your tresses with the snow,To mar your mirth of long ago.Change, Care, nor Time, while life endure,Shall spoil our ancient friendship sure,The love which flows from sacred springs,In ‘old unhappy far-off things,’From sympathies in grief and joy,Through all the years of man and boy.Therefore, to you, the rhymes I strungWhen even this ‘brindled’ head was youngI bring, and later rhymes I bringThat flit upon as weak a wing,But still for you, for yours, they sing!

Many of the verses and translations in this volume were published first in Ballads and Lyrics of Old France (1872). Though very sensible that they have the demerits of imitative and even of undergraduate rhyme, I print them again because people I like have liked them. The rest are of different dates, and lack (though doubtless they need) the excuse of having been written, like some of the earlier pieces, during College Lectures. I would gladly have added to this volume what other more or less serious rhymes I have written, but circumstances over which I have no control have bound them up with Ballades, and other toys of that sort.

It may be as well to repeat in prose, what has already been said in verse, that Grass of Parnassus, the pretty Autumn flower, grows in the marshes at the foot of the Muses’ Hill, and other hills, not at the top by any means.

Several of the versions from the Greek Anthology have been published in the Fortnightly Review, and the sonnet on Colonel Burnaby appeared in Punch. These, with pieces from other serials, are reprinted by the courteous permission of the Editors.

The verses that were published in Ballades and Lyrics, and in Ballads and Verses Vain (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York), are marked in the contents with an asterisk.

GRASS OF PARNASSUS

Pale star that by the lochs of Galloway,   In wet green places ’twixt the depth and heightDost keep thine hour while Autumn ebbs away,   When now the moors have doffed the heather bright,   Grass of Parnassus, flower of my delight,How gladly with the unpermitted bay—Garlands not mine, and leaves that not decay—   How gladly would I twine thee if I might!The bays are out of reach!  But far below   The peaks forbidden of the Muses’ Hill,Grass of Parnassus, thy returning snow   Between September and October chillDoth speak to me of Autumns long ago,   And these kind faces that are with me still.

DEEDS OF MEN

αειδε δ’ αρα κλέα ανδρωνTOCOLONEL IAN HAMILTONTo you, who know the face of war,You, that for England wander far,You that have seen the Ghazis flyFrom English lads not sworn to die,You that have lain where, deadly chill,The mist crept o’er the Shameful Hill,You that have conquered, mile by mile,The currents of unfriendly Nile,And cheered the march, and eased the strainWhen Politics made valour vain,Ian, to you, from banks of Ken,We send our lays of Englishmen!

SEEKERS FOR A CITY

“Believe me, if that blissful, that beautiful place, were set on a hill visible to all the world, I should long ago have journeyed thither.. But the number and variety of the ways! For you know, There is but one road that leads to Corinth.”

Hermotimus (Mr Pater’s Version).

“The Poet says, dear city of Cecrops, and wilt thou not say, dear city of Zeus?”

M. Antoninus.To Corinth leads one road, you say:Is there a Corinth, or a way?Each bland or blatant preacher hathHis painful or his primrose path,And not a soul of all of theseBut knows the city ’twixt the seas,Her fair unnumbered homes and allHer gleaming amethystine wall!Blind are the guides who know the way,The guides who write, and preach, and pray,I watch their lives, and I divineThey differ not from yours and mine!One man we knew, and only one,Whose seeking for a city’s done,For what he greatly sought he found,A city girt with fire around,A city in an empty landBetween the wastes of sky and sand,A city on a river-side,Where by the folk he loved, he died. 1Alas! it is not ours to treadThat path wherein his life he led,Not ours his heart to dare and feel,Keen as the fragrant Syrian steel;Yet are we not quite city-less,Not wholly left in our distress —Is it not said by One of old,Sheep have I of another fold?Ah! faint of heart, and weak of will,For us there is a city still!Dear city of Zeus, the Stoic says, 2The Voice from Rome’s imperial days,In Thee meet all things, and disperse,In Thee, for Thee, O Universe!To me all’s fruit thy seasons bring,Alike thy summer and thy spring;The winds that wail, the suns that burn,From Thee proceed, to Thee return.Dear city of Zeus, shall we not say,Home to which none can lose the way!Born in that city’s flaming bound,We do not find her, but are found.Within her wide and viewless wallThe Universe is girdled all.All joys and pains, all wealth and dearth,All things that travail on the earth,God’s will they work, if God there be,If not, what is my life to me?Seek we no further, but abideWithin this city great and wide,In her and for her living, weHave no less joy than to be free;Nor death nor grief can quite appalThe folk that dwell within her wall,Nor aught but with our will befall!

THE WHITE PACHA

Vain is the dream!  However Hope may rave,He perished with the folk he could not save,And though none surely told us he is dead,And though perchance another in his stead,Another, not less brave, when all was done,Had fled unto the southward and the sun,Had urged a way by force, or won by guileTo streams remotest of the secret Nile,Had raised an army of the Desert men,And, waiting for his hour, had turned againAnd fallen on that False Prophet, yet we knowGordon is dead, and these things are not so!Nay, not for England’s cause, nor to restoreHer trampled flag – for he loved Honour more —Nay, not for Life, Revenge, or Victory,Would he have fled, whose hour had dawned to die.He will not come again, whate’er our need,He will not come, who is happy, being freedFrom the deathly flesh and perishable things,And lies of statesmen and rewards of kings.Nay, somewhere by the sacred River’s shoreHe sleeps like those who shall return no more,No more return for all the prayers of men —Arthur and Charles – they never come again!They shall not wake, though fair the vision seem:Whate’er sick Hope may whisper, vain the dream!

MIDNIGHT, JANUARY 25, 1886

To-morrow is a year since Gordon died!   A year ago to-night, the Desert still   Crouched on the spring, and panted for its fillOf lust and blood.  Their old art statesmen plied,And paltered, and evaded, and denied;   Guiltless as yet, except for feeble will,   And craven heart, and calculated skillIn long delays, of their great homicide.A year ago to-night ’twas not too late.   The thought comes through our mirth, again, again;Methinks I hear the halting foot of Fate   Approaching and approaching us; and thenComes cackle of the House, and the Debate!   Enough; he is forgotten amongst men.

ADVANCE, AUSTRALIA

ON THE OFFER OF HELP FROM THE AUSTRALIANS AFTER THE FALL OF KHARTOUMSons of the giant Ocean isle   In sport our friendly foes for long,Well England loves you, and we smileWhen you outmatch us many a while,   So fleet you are, so keen and strong.You, like that fairy people set   Of old in their enchanted seaFar off from men, might well forgetAn elder nation’s toil and fret,   Might heed not aught but game and glee.But what your fathers were you are   In lands the fathers never knew,’Neath skies of alien sign and starYou rally to the English war;   Your hearts are English, kind and true.And now, when first on England falls   The shadow of a darkening fate,You hear the Mother ere she calls,You leave your ocean-girdled walls,   And face her foemen in the gate.

COLONEL BURNABY

συ δ’ εν στροφάλιγγι κονίης

κεισο μέγας μεγαλωστι, λελασμένος ιπποσυνάων

Thou that on every field of earth and sky   Didst hunt for Death, who seemed to flee and fear,How great and greatly fallen dost thou lie   Slain in the Desert by some wandering spear:‘Not here, alas!’ may England say, ‘not here   Nor in this quarrel was it meet to die,   But in that dreadful battle drawing nighTo thunder through the Afghan passes sheer:Like Aias by the ships shouldst thou have stood,   And in some glen have stayed the stream of flight,   The bulwark of thy people and their shield,When Indus or when Helmund ran with blood,   Till back into the Northland and the Night   The smitten Eagles scattered from the field.’

MELVILLE AND COGHILL

(THE PLACE OF THE LITTLE HAND.)

Dead, with their eyes to the foe,   Dead, with the foe at their feet,Under the sky laid low   Truly their slumber is sweet,Though the wind from the Camp of the Slain Men blow,   And the rain on the wilderness beat.Dead, for they chose to die   When that wild race was run;Dead, for they would not fly,   Deeming their work undone,Nor cared to look on the face of the sky,   Nor loved the light of the sun.Honour we give them and tears,   And the flag they died to save,Rent from the rain of the spears,   Wet from the war and the wave,Shall waft men’s thoughts through the dust of the years,   Back to their lonely grave!

RHODOCLEIA

TO RHODOCLEIA

ON HER MELANCHOLY SINGING

(Rhodocleia was beloved by Rufinus, one of the late poets of the Greek Anthology.)Still, Rhodocleia, brooding on the dead,Still singing of the meads of asphodel,   Lands desolate of delight?Say, hast thou dreamed of, or rememberèd,   The shores where shadows dwell,      Nor know the sun, nor see the stars of night?There, ’midst thy music, doth thy spirit gaze   As a girl pines for home,   Looking along the way that she hath come,Sick to return, and counts the weary days!So wouldst thou flee   Back to the multitude whose days are done,Wouldst taste the fruit that lured Persephone,The sacrament of death; and die, and be   No more in the wind and sun!Thou hast not dreamed it, but rememberèd   I know thou hast been there,Hast seen the stately dwellings of the dead   Rise in the twilight air,And crossed the shadowy bridge the spirits tread,   And climbed the golden stair!Nay, by thy cloudy hair   And lips that were so fair,Sad lips now mindful of some ancient smart,   And melancholy eyes, the haunt of Care,I know thee who thou art!   That Rhodocleia, Glory of the Rose,Of Hellas, ere her close,   That Rhodocleia who, when all was done   The golden time of Greece, and fallen her sun,Swayed her last poet’s heart.With roses did he woo thee, and with song,   With thine own rose, and with the lily sweet,      The dark-eyed violet,      Garlands of wind-flowers wet,And fragrant love-lamps that the whole night long      Burned till the dawn was burning in the skies,      Praising thy golden eyes,   And feet more silvery than Thetis’ feet!But thou didst die and flit   Among the tribes outworn,      The unavailing myriads of the past:   Oft he beheld thy face in dreams of morn,And, waking, wept for it,         Till his own time came at last,      And then he sought thee in the dusky land!Wide are the populous places of the deadWhere souls on earth once wed      May never meet, nor each take other’s hand,Each far from the other fled!So all in vain he sought for thee, but thou   Didst never taste of the Lethæan stream,         Nor that forgetful fruit,   The mystic pom’granate;But from the Mighty Warden fledst; and now,   The fugitive of Fate,   Thou farest in our life as in a dream,         Still wandering with thy lute,Like that sweet paynim lady of old song,Who sang and wandered long,   For love of her Aucassin, seeking him!So with thy minstrelsy   Thou roamest, dreaming of the country dim,Below the veilèd sky!There doth thy lover dwell,   Singing, and seeking still to find thy face   In that forgetful place:      Thou shalt not meet him here,      Not till thy singing clearThrough all the murmur of the streams of hell      Wins to the Maiden’s ear!May she, perchance, have pity on thee and call      Thine eager spirit to sit beside her feet,Passing throughout the long unechoing hall   Up to the shadowy throne,      Where the lost lovers of the ages meet;   Till then thou art alone!

AVE

      ‘Our Faith and Troth   All time and space controulesAbove the highest sphere we meetUnseen, unknowne, and greet as Angels greet.’Col. Richard Lovelace. 1649

CLEVEDON CHURCH

In MemoriamH. BWestward I watch the low green hills of Wales,   The low sky silver grey,The turbid Channel with the wandering sails   Moans through the winter day.There is no colour but one ashen light   On tower and lonely tree,The little church upon the windy height   Is grey as sky or sea.But there hath he that woke the sleepless Love   Slept through these fifty years,There is the grave that has been wept above   With more than mortal tears.And far below I hear the Channel sweep   And all his waves complain,As Hallam’s dirge through all the years must keep   Its monotone of pain.* * * * *Grey sky, brown waters, as a bird that flies,   My heart flits forth from theseBack to the winter rose of northern skies,   Back to the northern seas.And lo, the long waves of the ocean beat   Below the minster grey,Caverns and chapels worn of saintly feet,   And knees of them that pray.And I remember me how twain were one   Beside that ocean dim,I count the years passed over since the sun   That lights me looked on him,And dreaming of the voice that, save in sleep,   Shall greet me not again,Far, far below I hear the Channel sweep   And all his waves complain.

TWILIGHT ON TWEED

Three crests against the saffron sky,   Beyond the purple plain,The kind remembered melody   Of Tweed once more again.Wan water from the border hills,   Dear voice from the old years,Thy distant music lulls and stills,   And moves to quiet tears.Like a loved ghost thy fabled flood   Fleets through the dusky land;Where Scott, come home to die, has stood,   My feet returning stand.A mist of memory broods and floats,   The Border waters flow;The air is full of ballad notes,   Borne out of long ago.Old songs that sung themselves to me,   Sweet through a boy’s day dream,While trout below the blossom’d tree   Plashed in the golden steam.* * * * *Twilight, and Tweed, and Eildon Hill,   Fair and too fair you be;You tell me that the voice is still   That should have welcomed me.1870.

METEMPSYCHOSIS

I shall not see thee, nay, but I shall know   Perchance, the grey eyes in another’s eyes,Shall guess thy curls in gracious locks that flow   On purest brows, yea, and the swift surmise   Shall follow and track, and find thee in disguiseOf all sad things, and fair, where sunsets glow,When through the scent of heather, faint and low,   The weak wind whispers to the day that dies.From all sweet art, and out of all old rhyme,   Thine eyes and lips are light and song to me;The shadows of the beauty of all time,   In song or story are but shapes of thee;Alas, the shadowy shapes! ah, sweet my dear,   Shall life or death bring all thy being near?

LOST IN HADES

I dreamed that somewhere in the shadowy place,   Grief of farewell unspoken was forgot   In welcome, and regret remembered not;And hopeless prayer accomplished turned to praiseOn lips that had been songless many days;   Hope had no more to hope for, and desire   And dread were overpast, in white attireNew born we walked among the new world’s ways.Then from the press of shades a spirit threw   Towards me such apples as these gardens bear;And turning, I was ’ware of her, and knew   And followed her fleet voice and flying hair, —Followed, and found her not, and seeking you   I found you never, dearest, anywhere.

A STAR IN THE NIGHT

The perfect piteous beauty of thy face   Is like a star the dawning drives away;   Mine eyes may never see in the bright dayThy pallid halo, thy supernal grace;But in the night from forth the silent place   Thou comest, dim in dreams, as doth a stray   Star of the starry flock that in the greyIs seen, and lost, and seen a moment’s space.And as the earth at night turns to a star,   Loved long ago, and dearer than the sun,So in the spiritual place afar,   At night our souls are mingled and made one,And wait till one night fall, and one dawn rise,That brings no noon too splendid for your eyes.

A SUNSET ON YARROW

The wind and the day had lived together,   They died together, and far awaySpoke farewell in the sultry weather,Out of the sunset, over the heather,   The dying wind and the dying day.Far in the south, the summer levin   Flushed, a flame in the grey soft air:We seemed to look on the hills of heaven;You saw within, but to me ’twas given   To see your face, as an angel’s, there.Never again, ah surely never   Shall we wait and watch, where of old we stood,The low good-night of the hill and the river,The faint light fade, and the wan stars quiver,   Twain grown one in the solitude.

ANOTHER WAY

Come to me in my dreams, and then,One saith, I shall be well again,For then the night will more than payThe hopeless longing of the day.Nay, come not thou in dreams, my sweet,With shadowy robes, and silent feet,And with the voice, and with the eyes

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1

January 26, 1885.

2

M. Antoninus iv 23.